The same properties that made virtual machines (VMs) on IBM mainframes indispensable in the 1960's will eventually make VMs indispensable on today's servers and desktop machines. But as of today, they still have some evolving to do.

Microsoft's 2005 PDC conference introduces new platforms, language extensions, and more preview code than anyone could reasonably hope to become familiar with. Further, new capabilities are being touted for every major product, beginning with the upcoming Windows Vista client OS and extending to servers, languages, Office, and nearly every developer product. Read on for all the technical highlights, plus a full implementation example of the new LINQ data query feature.

Monitoring is a technology that can be used for both good and evil. Increasingly though, developers are facing moral dilemmas when asked to build monitoring applications that encroach on their own and their co-workers' privacy. How will you respond?

Capitalizing on (or perhaps responding to) renewed developer interest in DHTML stemming from the recent cross-browser implementations of the XMLHttpRequest object, used for client-to-server communications in AJAX applications, Microsoft announces "Atlas," which provides AJAX support for ASP.NET.

New tools, official release dates for Visual Studio 2005 and SQL Server 2005 (finally), and a new openness from Microsoft infuse this year's Tech·Ed with new developer capabilities, new power for IT administration and management, and a clear roadmap for developmentmaking this a very good time to be a developer.

Microsoft gives XML (and developers) a big boost by making the Office Open XML format the default in Office 12, giving enterprises the choice of XML or binary format, and offering a patch to ensure forward-compatibility for older Office versions.